 1999 EPA arrives in Libby to investigate news report about asbestos-related health crisis and later declares area a Superfund site. EPA has spent $86 million on cleanup. Grace moves headquarters to Columbia from Boca Raton, Fla.

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Norita, his wife, has different memories of the early 1960s -- of dust that spewed into the air, filling her husband's wallet and clinging to his laundered work clothes as she wrung them out to dry in the front room. That dust, now known to be contaminated with a particularly deadly form of asbestos from the mine, eventually sickened them both, they believe, and left two of their children coping with lung abnormalities.

The rail-thin cowboy, now 68, took several halting steps across the maroon carpet before settling heavily into a matching easy chair during a recent interview. A blazing fire in the living room was stoked high to ease his circulation troubles.

Even though Skramstad worked at the mine for less than three years, his job sometimes involved separating the vermiculite ore mined there and the asbestos that clung to it by hand -- increasing the chances his lungs would absorb the spiky asbestos fibers. After he developed a persistent cough in 1996, friends prodded him to visit an out-of-town doctor who diagnosed him with asbestosis and told him he had 10 years to live.

The Skramstad family is one of scores in Libby that have had to deal with diagnoses of asbestos-related disease. This town of fewer than 3,000 amounts to the biggest environmental disaster site in terms of human health that the Environmental Protection Agency has ever faced, government officials said.

Yesterday, federal prosecutors unsealed indictments against W.R. Grace & Co. and seven current and former executives for breaking environmental laws and conspiring to cover up what happened in Libby. Grace, now based in Columbia, and the officials deny the charges.

The criminal prosecution comes as long-awaited vindication for residents such as Mike Noble, 53, who worked at the mine for 21 years. He said his lungs now operate at 67 percent capacity, leaving him short of breath after physical activity.

"We need to tell corporate America, you need to be held responsible," Noble said, sipping coffee from a John Deere mug on a recent snowy morning.

A sign on Highway 2 leading up to Libby from Glacier National Park proclaims that Lincoln County is "better for business." The county, which encompasses Libby and the former Grace mine, also has the highest death rate in the nation from asbestos or asbestos-related conditions, according to evaluations by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, a unit of the Department of Health and Human Services.